Want to polish

Status
Not open for further replies.
L

length_of_pull_1

Member
Joined
Oct 19, 2019
Messages
85
I have a Taurus 66 in stainless with the matte finish. I think I hate it! There are light scratches everywhere on this thing and I think it gets new ones every time I take it to the range. So I think I would like to polish it to make it real purdy. Can I take some flitz and a rag and just have at it? Should I get out the dremel? It doesn't have to be super mirror shiny, just smooth enough to shine it up again at a later date when it gets more little marks on it. Thanks!
 
Yes! Flitz, Mother’s or similar will work. It’s an easy process but takes some time. Save yourself some cleanup and mask the ends of the cylinder and muzzle if you can. Be careful with the inside of the frame around the firing pin, pawl and cylinder stop as you don’t want to get a bunch of compound in those areas. I never Polish that part. Good luck!
 
With guns, it takes time and effort to achieve a polished finish that doesn’t look like bubba drank a 6-pack and then took steel wool to it.

Many cleaning/polishing compounds like Flitz are non abrasive. They work wonders on smooth steel, but it may not be able to knock down the bumps and smooth the divots that matte or sandblasted finishes often have without something more being used.

Research it first to see if it will do what you want, a half-arsed polish job is the last thing you want to get. :thumbup:

Good luck!

Stay safe.
 
Last edited:
And after you polish it it's going to get scratches on the polished finish which you aren't going to like and have to remove. :D

I am going to disagree with Riomouse about Flitz being non abrasive. You can polish metal by removing it to where it is very smooth which is done with abrasives or by burnishing it which flattens out the surface with pressure. Flitz is a very mild abrasive or it would do nothing.
 
Last edited:
length_of_pull_1 said:
. . . and I think it gets new ones every time I take it to the range. So I think I would like to polish it to make it real purdy.
Click to expand...
You're annoyed that a matte finish shows new marks every time you handle it, so you want to polish it?

Backwards much? A mirror polish is the most difficult of all finishes to fix

My suggestion is a fine Scotch Bright abrasive pad (start fine, you can always switch coarser), and buff to a directionsl matte. This will have a grain direction, but it's trivial to "fix".
 
doubleh

I have to disagree with you about Flitz. It is listed by the manufacturer as being non-acidic and non-abrasive. I have used it on nickel plated guns and blued guns and there is no sort of abrasion going on with either finish. I have used it on guns with a matte blued finish and it actually polished the bluing! I also have tried it on stainless steel but have found that Mother's Mag Polish does a better job with that kind of polishing. Flitz works great in removing dirt, oil, powder residue, and tarnish from the surfaces it's applied to and leaves behind a protective coating as well.

Some years ago I had a U.S. Model 1898 Krag Jorgensen that had been used by a local veteran's group for their Color Guard for parades and other functions. They had all of the metal parts bright chrome plated and a heavy layer of varnish applied to the wood furniture. I deplated the chrome parts by soaking them in Hoppe's No. 9 solvent and polished them before sending them out to be blued. At the time I had requested a nice rust blue finish for the rifle but what I got back looked more like the matte black you see with a wrought iron fence! Since I was going to have the gun reblued anyways I decided to see what would happen to the finish if I used Flitz on it. Not only did it not remove any of the bluing it actually polished it, making it look a thousand times better than before!
xwoHth6.jpg
G4lw9r8.jpg
Jg2grz6.jpg

This is what Mother's Mag Polish can do, done by hand polishing by a friend of mine over more than ten years ago! Still looking great!
KMDK8FD.jpg

And this is one that I did with Mother's Mag Polish about the same time as when the Vaquero was done.
thk5fLf.jpg

I used Flitz on the Model 686 because I wanted to just clean up the stainless steel and didn't want to give it a high gloss shine.
kRwd6un.jpg
 
Last edited:
doubleh said:
And after you polish it it's going to get scratches on the polished finish which you aren't going to like and have to remove. :D

I am going to disagree with Riomouse about Flitz being non abrasive. You can polish metal by removing it to where it is very smooth which is done with abrasives or by burnishing it which flattens out the surface with pressure. Flitz is a very mild abrasive or it would do nothing.
Click to expand...
Sadly, Flitz being abrasive is an oft quoted firearms myth.

Flitz says themselves on their website it is non abrasive. It is a chemical polish that does not contain any abrasive compounds.

https://www.flitz.com/faqs/?gclid=C...hhLtbRgE4jI5YR8O90zE-xM0CERCWFUhoC9jQQAvD_BwE

(Look under the heading “What if the Flitz makes no difference?”)

Flitz does work though. :thumbup:

Stay safe.
 
edwardware said:
You're annoyed that a matte finish shows new marks every time you handle it, so you want to polish it?

Backwards much? A mirror polish is the most difficult of all finishes to fix

My suggestion is a fine Scotch Bright abrasive pad (start fine, you can always switch coarser), and buff to a directionsl matte. This will have a grain direction, but it's trivial to "fix".
Click to expand...

I want to give it a finish I can fix. The way it is now, there isn't anything to do but deal with it :)
 
My usual comment on the subject is that power tools are a bad idea unless you really know what you're about. I have more than a few hours behind a polishing wheel and still doubt my ability to polish a stainless gun without making it look cheap. (I have my doubts whether Doug Turnbull himself could successfully polish a gun with a Dremel tool...)

I have had good results with Flitz or Mother's on a rag. It is not a one-day project, unless you have more patience (and stronger thumbs!) than I do, but if you approach it as something to do for an hour or two at a time in front of the TV, eventually you will have a good-looking finish.
 
Any substance that is capable of removing scratches IS abrasive, simple as that. You can't remove only the high spots on a given surface by a "chemical polish" - it will work on EVERY surface, high and low... You can't just polish a material (make it's surface smoother) with chemicals - it is not possible, no mater what the Ad is saying... It's just an abrasive, deal with it.
 
Riomouse911 said:
Sadly, Flitz being abrasive is an oft quoted firearms myth.

Flitz says themselves on their website it is non abrasive. It is a chemical polish that does not contain any abrasive compounds.

https://www.flitz.com/faqs/?gclid=C...hhLtbRgE4jI5YR8O90zE-xM0CERCWFUhoC9jQQAvD_BwE

(Look under the heading “What if the Flitz makes no difference?”)

Flitz does work though. :thumbup:

Stay safe.
Click to expand...

I have some and it makes steel shiny--if it was shiny to start with. If dull finished it stay dull. When polishing something with a little size I go to my buffer and use polishing compounds. With very small parts out comes the dremel and cotton bobs and the same assortment of polishing compounds. I am not going to mess around with Flitz.
 
Last edited:
Let me warn you right now ... if you think a matte finish picks up and shows scratches and marks ...
A high polish finish does it in spades and they show up 10X as bad ,,,
High polish is NOT going to hide scratch and range marks ... just the opposite will happen .
Nothing wrong with a high polish on stainless steel ... keep plenty polish on hand to polish out those range rubs and you will be fine ... some folks actually enjoy hand polishing .
I say ... Go For It !
Gary
 
Mizar said:
Any substance that is capable of removing scratches IS abrasive, simple as that. You can't remove only the high spots on a given surface by a "chemical polish" - it will work on EVERY surface, high and low... You can't just polish a material (make it's surface smoother) with chemicals - it is not possible, no mater what the Ad is saying... It's just an abrasive, deal with it.
Click to expand...
“It is because I said it is.”
There, you win. Happy now?
 
I guess I'll wade into the Flitz wars again. This is exactly right:

doubleh said:
You can polish metal by removing it to where it is very smooth which is done with abrasives or by burnishing it which flattens out the surface with pressure. Flitz is a very mild abrasive or it would do nothing.
Click to expand...

Flitz is an abrasive. It's a very mild abrasive, but it's an abrasive nonetheless. A "non-abrasive polishing compound" is a contradiction in terms. You can't polish without abrasion -- when you polish, you're removing metal/material.

Flitz is able to call its product "non-abrasive" because its formula falls below the federal government standard for abrasiveness. It is an actual abrasive -- it's just a weak enough abrasive that it can be called a non-abrasive under the government standard.

Moreover, Flitz itself will admit that this is the case if you ask them.
 
Last edited:
Sadly, Flitz being abrasive is an oft quoted firearms myth.

Flitz says themselves on their website it is non abrasive. It is a chemical polish that does not contain any abrasive compounds.
Click to expand...
You are absolutely correct about what Flitz claims.

However, in spite of that, Flitz is definitely abrasive.

Here's the MSDS for the standard Flitz polish. https://store-imlukvc.mybigcommerce.com/content/SDS - PastePolish_2021.pdf

Scroll down far enough and this appears: CAS 1344-28-1 Aluminum Oxides

Aluminum Oxide is, of course, an abrasive.

The reason Flitz can officially say it's non-abrasive is that the abrasive particles in it are small enough (3 to 3.5 microns) to satisfy some rule somewhere that differentiates between "abrasive" abrasives and "non-abrasive" abrasives based on the size of the abrasive particles.

Here's an email I found on the web from Flitz customer service.

Sir,

I'm sorry to keep you waiting for the answer to your question. I had to wait for our president, Ulrich "Olie" Jentzsch, to return from two trade shows for his official statement.

The gentleman that stated "if it is a polish, it has to be abrasive" is right in a very literal sense. However, you are also right about the Flitz, because our polish falls 12% below the government standard for abrasiveness. In other words, the polishing granules are so fine that Flitz can be considered non-abrasive. We can safely claim that because, as you can feel just by putting it between your fingers, it is very smooth. Flitz can be used on even the softest precious metals without scratching. (Of course, a person would have to consider the applicator cloth and make sure they are using a clean, high-quality, soft cloth to apply the polish and for buffing.)

I hope that this helps you. You are welcome to address any other questions or problems to us directly at [email protected] (for Customer Service) or [email protected] (for the president). Thank you again for your question and for using the Flitz. We always stand behind it and it's nice to have customers like yourself.

Kris
Flitz Customer Service​
 
Just for clarification - 3.0+-0.5 microns size of the particles (Aluminum Oxide) correlates to #4000 grit in JIS for sharpening stones. So they are not that small... There are much finer polishing compounds in use, that have no problem at all calling them "abrasive".
 
Let me get this straight, a gentleman asks about polishing a revolver with Flitz or another polish and this is the road we go down. It’s very common to polish stainless guns, done all the time. Will not hurt the gun. The beauty of a stainless gun is it’s ability to resist corrosion. They do scratch easy though. No matter if it’s polished or frosted (blasted). The nice thing about a polished finish is it can easily be shined up with little effort. Once the OP puts in the elbow grease to get his revolver looking like he wants he can occasionally give it a quick cleaning and polish to bring it back to that state. Something I wish could be done with nickel or blue.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Similar threads

W
  • Locked
Bought Taurus 66 6" Stainless...Matte to bright question
Replies
6
Views
1K
bannockburn
bannockburn
Confederate
  • Locked
Polishing a Revolver
Replies
11
Views
1K
flat top
F
A
  • Locked
Best way to polish machine marks in Stainless Vaquero
Replies
9
Views
989
AKElroy
A
L
  • Locked
Polished stainless issues...
Replies
5
Views
839
Sisco
S
Zaydok Allen
  • Locked
Ever polish a "Glass Bead Finish" on a S&W revolver?
Replies
16
Views
5K
bannockburn
bannockburn
Back
Top